3.5 kilo gold worth ₹4.39 crore seized from Sabyasachi Dutta's close aide in late night raid

A joint operational team from Bidhannagar North and Karimpur police stations seized nearly 3.5 kilograms of gold ornaments on Monday night. The massive raid was conducted at the paternal home of Tina Bhowmik Saha, a prominent Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader and Nadia Zilla Parishad member. Saha is known to be an extremely close associate of former TMC MLA Sabyasachi Dutta, who was recently arrested on severe extortion charges. The market value of the newly recovered gold is officially estimated at approximately ₹4.39 crore.

The midnight operation began around 11:45 PM when investigators unexpectedly raided the residence of Saha's father, located in the Kishorpur area of Karimpur, Nadia. Around 12:30 AM, a contingent of 21 police personnel cordoned off the entire premises and brought the detained politician, Sabyasachi Dutta, directly to the spot to confront the evidence. The comprehensive search continued through the night, directly acting on critical leads extracted from Dutta during aggressive custody interrogations regarding where he funneled his extortion money.

According to senior police sources, Dutta was arrested on June 8 under serious charges of running an extortion racket. Interrogators quickly discovered that a substantial portion of the extorted wealth was systematically converted into high-value gold assets for safe keeping. This latest seizure follows earlier investigative breakthroughs where detectives recovered three and a half kilograms of gold from Dutta’s personal apartment in Rajarhat and his bank lockers. Furthermore, authorities have already frozen five distinct bank accounts and fixed deposits belonging to Dutta and his wife, Indrani Dutta, cumulatively valued at ₹3.70 crore.

While law enforcement officials had formally summoned Tina Bhowmik Saha for questioning regarding her financial transactions, she notably skipped the administrative deadline. Her father has publicly claimed that the seized jewelry consists entirely of inherited family wealth. However, local residents and opposition leaders vehemently dispute this assertion, alleging that Saha is the true beneficiary.